SEAN MCWEENEY ON A. F. ADDERLEY | 3 October 2020
Wonderful tribute to the Hon A.F. Adderley, the greatest lawyer of his generation (as his son, Paul Adderley, was of his) and one of the finest Bahamian statesmen of any age.
How did he and T A Toote ( former Attorney and Black Member of the House of Assembly in the early 20th century) even think about such career advances in such early days…how come they got the head start?
Yes, head-starts they had indeed. Both T A Toote and A.F Adderley came from ambitious, prominently placed and comparatively privileged black families. A.F Adderley’s father, for example, was William Parliament ( “W.P”) Adderley, who was himself a prominent member of the House of Assembly for many years and a successful downtown merchant as well. He was the owner of “The Big Store” on or near Marlborough Street. This enabled him to send his son, Alfred (“A.F”), off to boarding school in England – Denstone College – from an early age.
The original Adderley in The Bahamas, Alladay Adderley, A.F’s great grandfather, was a native of present day Nigeria. He became a “Liberated African” upon his arrival in Nassau following the interception of the slaveship he was on (it was probably headed for Cuba, possibly Brazil). By the time of his death, however, Alladay had become one of the largest landowners in New Providence, owning most of the land that runs from Goodman’s Bay to the present-day Stapleton Gardens and into a large swath of where Harrold Road is on its western side.